No Angels
by Akky-chan
Summary: chapt 167 CROSS pov, because Allen has no angels and Cross will never be one, all he can do is cope. Cross was never good at real hugs, but he hoped this was enough to help Allen, maybe just a bit. Parental!Cross & Broken!Allen, nice, right? T for themes


**I took a challenge. I fickin killed myself tryin to write this, and I totally bombed. Cross is probably OOC somewhere in here, but he was pretty odd in the last chapter, so I'm hoping I wasn't to far off. **

**If no one can guess what 'the challenge' I took was... I FRICKIN WROTE CHAPTER 167 FROM CROSS'S POV!! TELL ME THAT ISN'T HARD?! ...sob my hands are dead, and I mean it, they hurt like crap, cuz I started this at 3pm and it is now 11:25 pm. On and off typing. They. Hurt. Normally I wouldn't complain about something like that, but today, they REALLY hurt.**

**If ANYONE thinks that killing your beloved ones is cleche, yes it is, but think a moment, is there anything more horrible? If necessary, I WILL post a rant on this, just ask and it's up in less than a day, promise ya that.**

**Cross is hardly an angel, but at this point, he's the closest thing Allen has, so the lyrics in italics are the beginning and end of 'Arms of An Angel' by Sarah McLaughlin. Please try and listen to it while reading. **

**I don't own "Arms of an Angel", City of Angels (where the music is from) or D.Gray-Man, and that's probably a good thing**

_Spend all your time waiting for that second chance. For a break that would make it okay._

"You are the host necessary for his revival," I said. I didn't want to look at the kid standing behind me, but I decided after all this, he deserved to at least see my face. I turned around smiling that same haughty smile I always wore around him. I wonder if he noticed that I wasn't quite there today, I hid most of the flaws in my mask by pulling up my cigarette and taking a drag. The smoke filled my lungs. Allen had given me so many lectures on smoking and it's horror to your health, and I still smoked. It was somewhat cruel to ignore him like that, but when you are an exorcist, you need a lot to keep your mind off the horror that is the world. I didn't want Allen to turn up as me, so I made sure he would never drink the first moment I could and he hated the smell of smoke, even if he was use to it.

Women, however... Allen was not the type to go out and seek them like that. He was similar to a woman in several aspects, which was not necessarily a bad thing. It meant he could see the world from both viewpoints if he chose. The one of the male, where ego and pride ruled, and that of the woman, kind hearted and slightly obsessive when spurred. If Allen was really going to be with a woman, he would be sure to love her truly first. I decided he should have earned that much.

There was little trace of that boy left in the eyes of my apprentice. They were hallow and wide with shock, a face I had never seen on him before, not once. Never once could I recall in my memory when he had looked so beaten utterly. I had known him for longer than three years, though not by more than sight and voice and name.

"The reason you knew the player's song and were able to play the piano though you never had before, was because that wasn't really 'you'," I hoped some of this was entering that thick skull of his. No, he wasn't stupid like I often claimed, he was actually rather smart for a boy raised on the streets... actually, I supposed he had to be smart, otherwise he might not have lived long enough to meet Mana. "Those were the Fourteenth's 'memories'."

I briefly recalled Allen's startled voice coming through the translator as he saw the shadow in the mirror. "You saw something then, didn't you?"

That was about the time I noticed he had been silent and frozen for almost thirty seconds. No blinking or anything, and it didn't exactly look as though he were drawing breath. I knew this boy to do strange things, but this was not healthy, and we would not be getting anywhere if he didn't wake up soon. Paralysis from shock from being told the truth... what a way would that be to go?

I did what I was expected, and rightly invited to do. I gotta say, the kid was still as sort as ever, probably malnutrition when he was younger, or, it could have been that I was simply much taller than him. Taller than most men, actually. Whatever it was that made him short, it couldn't have saved him from me as I raised my hand up and smacked him. How many times had I done that, anyway? Even his pety complaint was normal at this point.

"That— hurt—" He gingerly rubbed the spot on his face where my hand connected. He was lying on the floor, not that I could actually blame him. Short plus taller and brute force did tend to upset 'small', even if he had once been one of the best-balanced clowns in the circus.

"This conversation wont get anywhere if you just lie there," I said more edgily than necessary. I knew for a fact that this kid would bombard me with questions if I got him going, there was really no need to edge him on at this point, I would just have to wait and I would get...

"I'm... implanted..." When he said it that way, for some reason it sounded very, very wrong. "When...?"

"Huh? Oh, Sorry I have no idea," Allen twitched. Of course, he hated me every time I didn't give him enough information or information that was not accurate enough for him.

"Huh?"

"Oh, wait, I think I know. Probably before the fourteenth died!" I said. It wasn't a joke, I really didn't know, but it was fun just to see his reactions sometimes...

"I don't know when that was!" I never actually though I would see Allen with an anger tic on his forehead. It was rather amusing, actually.

"What? I said I was sorry, get over it!" My patience never lasts long or some reason. I found myself becoming angry again, like I had when I learned he had finally been done-in. I scowled, shutting Allen up and took in another drag before continuing. "I didn't believe it either, until you appeared, that is." I said.

Allen finally took a breath. I continued. "His life was hellish after he tried to kill the Earl," I looked down to see the affect this was having on Allen. He had tried to kill the Earl as well, and I had watched him. I claimed I needed him and that was quite true, but there was another factor that had played in my rescue aside from his almost unique ability. "He and Mana were constantly on the run, engaged in a life or death battle with the Noah." I couldn't stand to see someone who looked so much like, acted so much like, and ultimately held him inside... die in front of me. One loss is bad, two is worse. Allen knew what that meant plenty well.

Allen had somehow gotten himself into a sitting position without the use of his arms and was now listening intently. I noted his eyes were no longer wide with shock but focused, like he was holding every word close to him, for fear he might forget. Yes, there was fear there, but it was simply a tint. My apprentice was not the one who would stop along with fear. I knew that much.

I saw the question in him before he could find it himself. It was a common question, that everyone seemed to ask. "He probably didn't have time to dwell on the 'who' and 'when'," I said, trying on the stoic leader facade. "When he got the chance, he just chose whoever was nearby to be his host... so he could kill the Earl with his own hands."

Allen's eyes widened, somewhere between jealousy and terror. He wanted to be the one to stop the Earl, and I knew it damn well.

"And... that's me?" He asked, despair surfacing in his voice, which at age twelve had been strong, even after the second death of his loved one.

"You were unlucky," I said. Damn straight, the kid was the unluckiest out there as far as I was concerned. There was no point in trying to comfort him, or soften the words for his already abused ears. It just had to be said that he was no longer walking his own path. "The implanted memories will eventually erode the host... and change you into the Fourteenth."

"There have been signs, havent there?" As I spoke, I watched his face fall into shadow, making the scar on the left side of his face seem so much bolder and deeper, and his silver eyes grew wide and somewhere filled with horror and sadness. I could almost see him sitting there with a great shadow looming over him. Allen's head shot up a moment, as though a chill had shot through him. _So he does see something..._ Allen's head fell down again, into shadow only white hair can cast.

"So that's what that was..." He really did see something. A shadow, perhaps, things that weren't really there, I didn't know exactly, but it was something. Allen slunked down more into himself, his back slumping over and his arms hanging loose, resting on the floor between his legs. "What the hell?" His voice was higher than I would have thought. It was cracking, like he was near tears. I couldn't actually guess what had torn him up so much.

"When Mana... said he loved me," Oh God. "Did he mean.. me? Or..." A broken little boy, sitting in front of a tombstone that would one day hold two bodies. Isolated at the top of the hill, where he sat, weeping. But here he was today, tortured beyond repair but still strong. I wasn't quite sure why, but I really hated to see Allen like that. "Which is it?"

I sighed. There was no way he was going to be able to pull this off. I was going to kill Allen myself if I didn't say anything. "Mana kind of lost it after the Fourteenth died." I said, kneeling down to him. He didn't have to look up to me anymore, he was already stronger than me to not be in tears at this far in.

"Who knows whether he remembered the past or not?" I remembered back when Tim would watch for me from the treetops, as a little boy with brown hair would colapse from exhaustion and a clown would come and pick him up, giving him a piggyback as they walked along to the closest thing for a home they had. "At least I couldn't tell." Mana had been much happier after he met Allen, that was all I could tell. I gave a sad little smile.

"It's ironic." I said. Allen was pulled into me. I wasn't good at real hugs, but this was probably the closest thing to a hug Allen had gotten in a long, long time. I hoped it would suffice. I never thought it would be a kid like this. "He should have chosen some good-for-nothing as his host..." How many times exactly had I told Allen he was worthless? How many times had I tried so hard to distance myself from the boy who desperately groped around in the dark, searching with a left and right hand for a guiding light which no one could ever give him.

In the end.. did you always have to sacrifice something to protect something else? That was the only thing that ever seemed to happen in this world. Take and take, and never give any, and when the end came, you just had to take back. It was proof the world was a hell-hole, and all the more proof the Noahs were right. But that didn't matter, because we all loved this hell-hole we lived in. In the end, all that was there was what was in front of us, and that was all Allen would ever see.

"I cant laugh at Tiedoll anymore... jeez..." Allen was frozen next to my ribcage, but he hadn't tensed up too much. He was okay with me being... there for once. He had been waiting for me to crack and show the not-so Cross part. He was a really good kid. Born from the wreckage, raise in war, and needing some comfort here. Something that not Cross nor anyone else would ever be able to give him ever again.

He deserved to know.

"What would you do if I told you you'll have to kill those you love when you become the Fourteenth?"

I could see the strength in him break apart right there. I wondered how long tonight he would stay up, crying.

_In the arms of the angel, may you find some comfort here_.

I wondered how long he had left, and if it would be enough for him to forgive us all. For everything.


End file.
